PSP is awesome, and has many cool ports/enhanced versions. Final Fantasy Tactics, one of my favourite games of all time, is one of them. Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together, is another, and it's by mostly the same people who made the amazing Tactics (it's also older - it's an SNES game).

Before starting the game, I naturally watched the intro, and it showed that it would be a story similar to Tactics - medieval times, wars, political scheming. It's about the Valerian Isles, and the events, at least in the beginning, take place on the biggest one of them. The king who had united the isles died, leaving no heir (gee, isn't that familiar), and the different clans he had managed to subdue quickly rekindle the flames of war.

The hero, Denam Pavel, happens to be part of the weakest clan as the game begins... But we all know that isn't going to last because we will change our people's fate. Already after the first 2-3 battles, we free the Wallister Duke from captivity, and things will only get better for Wallister from there, thanks to, of course, Denam and his crew. Characters have names that are generally difficult to remember... Denam's sister is called Catiua or something like that.

Amusingly, in the very beginning, Denam, Catiua and Vyce (a friend of Denam) attack a bunch of mercenaries mistaking them for a force that previously sacked their town (turns out their leader simply had the same name as the leader of the Dark Knights of Lodis who did that). After the misunderstanding is cleared up, they somehow convince the mercenaries who apparently hail from Xenobia (a nation on a continent, it seems), that freeing the Duke of Wallister would yield them good coin.

Everything about the gameplay is very similar to Tactics, but the fields battles take place in feel bigger, as the characters and terrain tiles are smaller. The first few battles are won quite easily, you don't even really need to upgrade your units, or buy weapons, or anything. Nevertheless, I recruited a couple of new units to add to the several cool lads and girls who had already joined my crew, the Order of Godscale (that's the name of the first month in the game's calendar).

There's a random name generator for people you recruit (done from shops in towns you have "conquered," meaning you won a battle there), and I really wanted to recruit an Enchantress and a Valkyrie (who disappointingly turned out to be simply the female versions of the black mage and the spear guy). Interestingly, after many resets in trying to get a cool name, the very Bulgarian name Nikolina popped up (my late grandma, as well as one of my best friends carry that name). So I recruited Nikolina the Valkyrie. For your recruits, there's also Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic alignment whose gameplay function I have no idea about yet. Nikolina happened to be Lawful.

I also unlock an awesome skill for Denam (who still sits in the Squire-like Warrior class) which grants 100% critical rate for his melee attacks. I also try to teach him Field Chemistry which is necessary to use healing items that aren't total crap, but don't have enough skill points yet. So I teach it to this winged guy, Canopus, who's probably my strongest fighter at this point, being able to attack both melee and ranged via shortbow.

Then comes the first difficult battle of the game... Against a necromancer called Nymbeth or something like that. Fortunately, these battles always seem to require you to just kill the opposing force's leader to win them. Not that undead units can even be killed - when you bring their HP down to 0, you only knock them down for 3 turns, then they rise with full HP. Well, at least healing spells hurt them. Also, battle takes place on a hill and you start at the bottom. Gotta climb up to reach and attack the necromancer because he sure isn't coming down.

I lost the first try where I went in with no real tactics (not yet knowing what to expect), then I lost the second one when I'd figured out I'd just send Canopus and Denam charging, but Canopus got killed too early and Denam got within a hit of killing Nybeth (that's apparently the correct name), but was then killed. Third time was the charm - I sent Canopus, Denam and a knight called Voltaire or something like that, while the rest chilled at the back, drawing some of the skeletons, and healed each other.

Voltaire was just cannon fodder and managed to draw a few attacks away from Denam and Canopus. Nybeth was also stupid this time and instead of retreating to the very back and requiring me to take as many turns as possible to get to him, just sat in the middle of the battlefield, casting spells. I got him down to 56 HP or so, and had a chance to hit him with Denam, but only for 40 HP or so. So I use the 100% critical skill (Mighty Strike or something like that), and I hit him for 60, and win the battle. And the dude just transforms into a crow and flies away. Conveniently, even the units from my team who had currently fallen, but not past the resurrection limit (3 turns, like in Tactics), got experience. XP is equally divided between all classes and then all units that participated. Classes and units seem to upgrade separately.

I upgrade my units a bit, giving Vyce Mighty Impact and a corresponding skill to the archer, too. Also, the white mages learn Recruit, which will enable me to recruit enemy soldiers. Neat! In the next battle, I face a freaking DRAGON. And a bunch of soldiers, of course. Dragon does great damage and can take a lot of hits, but is stupid and comes my way, eventually getting surrounded and pounded to oblivion by my units. However... There's an AI-controlled woman I must save and she OF COURSE rushes into the enemy ranks instead of coming near my units where I can heal her. Game over. I suppose I'll have to redo this battle until the AI decides to be less dumb.

Well trolled, game, she didn't join me either way. -_- I just wasted time redoing the battle several times until I won. And now, I need to decide which of the two saves to continue from. Denam fights for the freedom of Wallister, or Denam fights for peace? I like when games make you think like that, even with seemingly insignificant choices. I delayed my decision until tomorrow.

So I beat the beastmaster dude, though it took me 2 tries. The first time he was smart enough to fall back after getting hurt. He also teleported away instead of getting killed. Seems we'll meet again. Before that, I decided to replace my useless second archer with the Bakram enchantress Beatrix I'd hired along with Nikolina earlier. I taught her lightning magic. Then, I arrived at the miner town Balmamusa, and a battle naturally ensued... For once, I had to defeat everybody, not just the enemy leader. Haven't completed it yet, but it seems quite easy. Will do so on my way back home.

Actually, if you had chosen the other option, no one would have stopped you, and the course of the entire playthrough would have changed. There's a couple moments like that in the game that determine what battles come up in the next chapters, and your 'alignment' (one choice might get you to Chapter 2L, for Lawful, or another to 2C, for Chaotic).

Yeah, it was quite the bold title back in the day. Not as good as FFT, but undeniably the game that helped FFT to exist more than any other. And I think the branching paths lead to 5 or 6 different endings, not sure exactly how many.

I won that battle easily, only to then find out that the massacre happens anyway, and Galgastan are blamed for it, and somehow I am blamed for it, too, and a reward on my head is announced. Chapter 2 begins... with some woman assaulting my group. Denam and Abuna Donnalto try to talk some sense to her, but she won't budge. Will have to kill her... Though the game may be nice and prevent it. Afterwards, I am to join with the Holy Knight Lanselot, who I hope to convince to help me out. Also, it seems, from the Warren report at least (the section where you're reading about the story and related events as an outside observer), that Denam will eventually try to overthrow the Duke. Cool.

So I'm off to Tynemouth Hill to meet with Lanselot, and on the way some dumb headhunter attacked me. It was a rather easy battle, again due to only needing to destroy him, not the whole group. But he teleported away at the end... I wonder if such a crude character will have a role later. I'm feeling more and more powerful with the new skills I'm learning. It's just annoying my wizards and priests only need 2 hits to die, I'm trying to teach them to dodge and shit. Then, on the next dot on the map, I meet Arycelle, the archer woman, again. Galgastani are attacking her and I must save her (though, by how the battle is developing, she might be able to kill them all by herself... Though it'd take some time. She's dodging hits like crazy). Anyway, Abuna Donnalto keeps talking sense to her, and she reveals she was in love with Leonar and that probably blinded her - her belief that we were responsible for the massacre is faltering, and I think we'll have a new member of the group once this battle is done. We need to just defeat the enemy leader again.

Dragons in this game are strong, but the lack of ranged attacks really limits their value. Fairies and gremlins make for good archers with their secondary skills to help out. I am glad you are enjoying it, but if you're like me you will eventually start to really miss the incredible customization options FFT had for your characters. Here, each class is reduced to the most basic elements.

The power was out for like 15 minutes today so I thought I'd see what happens in this battle... And I managed to win with ease! Vyce teleported away as soon as I got his health down to like 20%. Hah! I'll see how the story will keep developing tomorrow.